“In contrast to the forethought and sober plodding of the peasant, the work of the miner is the calm of random effort: irregular in routine and uncertain in result. Neither the peasant nor the herdsman can get rich quickly: the first clears a field or plants a row of trees this year from which perhaps only his grandchildren will get the full benefits. The rewards of agriculture are limited by the known qualities of soil and seed and stock: cows do not calve more quickly one year than another, nor do they have fifteen calves instead of one; and for the seven years of abundance seven lean years, on the law of averages, are pretty sure to follow. Luck for the peasant is usually a negative fact: hail, wind, blight, rot. But the rewards of mining may be sudden, and they bear little relation, particulrlarly in the early stages of the industry, with to the technical ability of the miner or the amount of labour he has expended. One assiduous prospector may wear out his heart for years without finding a rich seam; a newcomer in the same district may strike luck in the first morning he goes to work. While certain mines, like the salt mines of Salzkammergut, have been in existence for centuries, the occupation in general is an unstable one.”
From Technics and Civilisation by Lewis Mumford
Mining was also typically an occupation that no-one entered unless as a prisoner of war, a criminal, a slave. Often as a form of punishment. The prospecting was also a key instigator for the rise of capitalism.